Dear Friends: 

The State Treasurer is an Office that was created in Wisconsin’s Constitution.  It was created to provide a check on the authority of the Governor and Legislature on State financial matters.  The Treasurer has the same Constitutional authority as does the Attorney General.  Until recently, the Legislature has chosen to endow the Treasurer with the administration of the State unclaimed property fund, the Local Government Investment program, and, the State Edvest college savings program.
Unfortunately, the Legislature has now reallocated the administration of these programs to the Executive Branch, further empowering a Governor who is already the most powerful Chief State Executive in the country. Among these actions are growing calls to abolish the Office of State Treasurer.

But, If you abolish the Office, you don’t “reduce government;“ you only eliminate a voice of the people, a duly elected, independent, Constitutional Officer. 
We need a voice like that envisioned in the Constitution, a State Treasurer that provides an independent resource on State budget and financial matters, an independent voice than can help advise the public and elected officials about issues that affect taxpayers.

I’ve got nearly three decades in public budgeting and finance and I hope to use my fiscal management and policy skills as a resource to help the public navigate the often mystifying State budget process and help provide education about important state fiscal matters.

Government is about improving people’s lives.  That’s why I want to be State Treasurer.

Some folks will continue to think that the State Treasurer is a Constitutional relic that should be eliminated. I suggest that there are more important adjustments to the Constitution to be made that take precedence over elimination of the State Treasurer: changing the redistricting process, ensuring voter rights, and strengthening civil liberties--to name a few. In any case, there will be an election for Wisconsin State Treasurer in November, 2014. I hope you will consider that I will use my decades on the front lines of budgeting and policymaking  to help educate the public about important issues, to reinvigorate the role of the Treasurer as an independent voice on State financial matters and to reclaim the vision of the Treasurer as included in the Constitution.   
                
I’ve always loved our system of governance,however flawed it might be.  As a kid, I used to tag along with my Dad to various campaign headquarters, collecting political paraphernalia.  When I moved to Wisconsin from  Boston in 1978,  I was 19 years old, a year out of high school, not sure what I was going to do, but I was well aware of Wisconsin’s reputation for clean government, the legacy of Fighting Bob LaFollette, and I was hopeful.

It’s been a few years since, and we’ve had some victories, many disappointments-, but I am still hopeful. 

As a candidate for State Treasurer, I offer you an alternative, a different vision for the Office.

If elected, I promise to provide a forceful and independent voice on State financial issues and to use my 25 years  in public sector budgeting and investments to build a State Treasurer’s Office that is efficient, responsive, that honors public service and is reflective of our best democratic values.

Thank you for considering my candidacy.